Evaluating Inclusive Recycling

Practices Under Brazil’s National

Solid Waste Policy

D-BRIEF from MIT D-Lab – Summer 2018

Impact of inclusive solid waste policy in Braziln the summer of 2017, MIT City Planning Master’s student Talia Fox spent six

weeks in Belo Horizonte, Brazil researching the experiences of wastepickers

participating in corporate social responsibility (CSR) programs established

under the PNRS. Her research in Brazil builds upon previous MIT D-Lab student

work exploring mobile technologies for wastepicker cooperatives with the Danone

Ecosystem Fund through the course D-Lab: Waste, as well as D-Lab’s Practical

Impact Alliance (PIA) Inclusive Recycling Working Group.

The research suggests that while some CSR programs can provide structural,

administrative, and social support for wastepickers, due to the fact that corporations

controlled the development of the PNRS and its programs, wastepickers remain

insufficiently compensated for their services. Drawing from the successes and

challenges of the PNRS, this D-Brief identifies strategies to ensure that waste

management policy in middle and low-income countries benefits small-scale,

informal waste actors as they fight for respect, fair pay, and legal protections.

IRESEARCH OBJECTIVESUnderstand the origins and outcomes of mechanisms in the 2010 National Solid Waste Policy of Brazil (PNRS) that require the incorporation of informal recyclers, or wastepickers, into formal waste systems1

Represent wastepickers’ perspectives on their partnerships with corporations, which result from the provision of the PNRS that mandates extended producer responsibility (EPR), or “reverse logistics”

Recommend approaches to policy that ensures the participation of all stakeholders, including the informal sector, in EPR systems in Brazil and other middle and low-income countries

Key findings and recommendations The participatory system that the PNRS prescribes:

• perpetuates power imbalances among businesses, government, and wastepickers;

• reinforces a lack of corporate and government accountability through democratic processes;

• provides unfair compensation to wastepickers for their economic, social, and environmental work; and

• facilitates some improvement for wastepickers in terms of income, autonomy, and recognition.

To improve implementation of the PNRS, decision-makers should:

• establish specific guidelines and enforcement mechanisms for sector agreements among industry players, including financial disclosure requirements;

• encourage participation of municipal leaders in discussions regarding the role of CSR programs in their cities;

• compensate wastepickers as market actors by assessing the value of their contributions to waste systems; and

• utilize data-driven incentives to support recycling activities to ensure mutually beneficial outcomes for wastepickers and corporations.Talia Fox with founding member of the COOPERSUL

cooperative in Poços de Caldas, Minas Gerais.

Study methodologyhe primary sources for the research were 16 semi-structured

interviews (30-60 minutes each) conducted in Portuguese

during six weeks in June and July of 2017, in the city of Belo

Horizonte, Minas Gerais. Interviewees included representatives of

wastepicker cooperatives and associations, also called membership-

based organizations (MBOs), municipal and state government,

industry, academia, private foundations, and nonprofits involved

in work related to waste. Interviews were coded into themes and

triangulated with notes from observations of meetings and events

attended during the study period, as well as literature, reports, and

popular sources. Also informing the study conclusions were thirty-

four interviews conducted with members of eight wastepicker

cooperatives and associations in January of 2017 in southeast Brazil,

as part of the aforementioned D-Lab PIA project.

Waste management context in Brazil

T he PNRS emerged from the volatile politics of labor

organizing and private sector control following Brazil’s

military dictatorship (1964-1985). The PNRS is therefore

considered a major victory for leaders of Brazil’s national

wastepickers’ movement (MNCR), who successfully fought for

wastepicker representation in the law. Wastepickers in Brazil play an

important role in the country’s waste management systems, but like

many wastepickers around the globe, they are not often recognized

or remunerated for their work.

Under the terms of the PNRS, product manufacturers must

implement EPR or “reverse logistics,” a policy concept that attributes

responsibility for the disposal of post-consumer materials to the

manufacturer of a product. To establish Brazil’s EPR system for

packaging, 20 groups of 3,786 producers and manufacturers signed

a sector agreement, which states that these corporations will partner

with wastepicker MBOs to recycle post-consumer packaging.

Analysis of policy and programs: findings and recommendationsPower imbalances 444 Participation of municipal leaders

ccording to interviewees, despite the participation of

diverse sectors in the formation of the PNRS, the business

lobby heavily influenced the regulation. By law, businesses

control the formation of sector agreements to implement EPR.

As a result, their priorities appeared in the first iterations of the

agreement. Researchers (Besen and Jacobi 2017) have determined

that business leaders also dominated the public comment and review

process for their own agreement proposal, leaving out wastepickers

and municipalities. The absence of municipal participation, in

particular, threatens a political emphasis on the city in Brazil in the

past two decades and associated policies supporting the urban poor.

To ensure that wastepickers retain an ally in decision-making

processes, city leaders should play a more central role in

discussions with the packaging sector and federal facilitators. Many

municipalities already invest in wastepicker MBOs by providing

physical infrastructure and paying for utilities, or even contracting

MBOs to manage collection. Future iterations of the packaging

sector agreement should acknowledge this by requiring businesses

to compensate municipalities for the service they are performing

in facilitating reverse logistics. Finally, government can work with

civil society actors to reinvigorate programs like the Waste and

Citizenship Forums, which can strengthen partnerships between

municipalities and wastepickers.

Lack of corporate and government accountability 444 Guidelines and enforcement mechanisms

rom the perspectives of wastepickers and allies interviewed,

a law designed to support corporate interests means little

enforcement of the primary goal of PNRS: to hold all waste

actors accountable. Industry representatives and wastepickers alike

explained that corporations had financial incentives to push for

less stringent recyclable material quotas and taxation structures

within the sector agreement. Furthermore, investment in MBOs is

inconsistent and arbitrary: some corporations, including Danone

through its CSR program Novo Ciclo, contribute significant

resources, while others do not even participate in the sector

agreement and are not penalized.

To promote improved accountability, transparency is key. The sector

agreement should require that individual corporations disclose

expenditures, as well as the means by which they decide how to

Evaluating Inclusive Recycling Practices Under Brazil’s National Solid Waste Policy

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Leaders of the Futura Cooperative in São José dos Campos, São Paulo.

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D-Brief from MIT D-Lab Summer 2018

A leader of the ACAMAR association in Lavras, Minas Gerais and a Novo Ciclo staff member reviewing ACAMAR’s administrative documents.

invest through CSR programs. Guidelines for these programs should

further ensure that companies invest in a meaningful way. According

to wastepickers and nonprofit staff interviewed, investments

should support long-term commitment to a group, rather than a

temporary project or donation of technology, as well as staff that will

develop mutually trusting and communicative relationships with

wastepickers. CSR programs should also be required to acknowledge

publicly that their investments are not charitable; they respond to

legal requirements intended to compensate the legitimate work of

economic actors.

Unfair compensation to wastepickers 444 Wastepickers as market actors

he lack of financial accountability discussed above specifically

presents challenges for the wastepickers as they advocate levels

of investment that appropriately remunerate their work.

Adapting CSR programs to fulfill EPR saves corporations money,

despite the fact that they serve very different purposes. Because of the

charitable nature of CSR, the PNRS does not require that businesses

invest in wastepicker MBOs at a rate proportional to the quantities

of material the MBOs recycle. Nevertheless, corporations may assert

that they have recycled this material by submitting data to fill their

EPR material quotas under the PNRS.

Wastepickers and MBOs should be compensated as market actors

for the services they provide as recyclers, environmental educators,

economic engines for municipalities and regions, and spaces of

professional, economic, and social development. Where possible,

investments should be proportional to a standardized calculation of

the value that the wastepicker MBOs contribute to the waste system,

in terms of quantities of materials processed, miles traveled, and/or

natural resources saved.

Some improvements for wastepickers 444 Data-driven incentives to support recycling activities

astepickers and nonprofit staff interviewed widely agree

that Danone’s Novo Ciclo and similarly-structured

programs have made improvements to wastepicker

livelihoods and cooperative processes. At the same time, many CSR

partnerships withhold benefits from smaller cooperatives that need

the most support. This challenge exists because the packaging sector

agreement incentivizes companies to seek out the most productive

MBOs, generally located in the most developed cities. Submitting

data on the quantities that MBOs produce is the way to prove

compliance, so if businesses collect data from a single, larger MBO,

rather than several smaller MBOs, they can save on administrative

and logistical costs.

Rather than prioritizing World Cup cities as sites for investment,

as the current agreement does, future agreement iterations should

require that a certain percentage of business investment go to

smaller, less productive MBOs to support improved incomes and

autonomy. Furthermore, the mere submission of production data

should not prove that a company has recycled. Future agreements

could require that corporations, wastepickers, and government

develop collaborative definitions of what counts as evidence for

recycling. These alternative metrics could incentivize corporations

to invest meaningfully, while providing a more accurate picture of

the material recycled and the livelihoods improved.

A member of the COOMARP Pampulha cooperative sort recy-clable materials.

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Founded in 2002 and based at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, MIT D-Lab works with people around the worldto develop and advance collaborative approaches and practical solutions to global poverty challenges.

Next steps uture installments of this research can more broadly

represent the perspectives of government and industry

in the development of the PNRS and packaging sector

agreement. Next steps, to that end, will include speaking to a wider

range of corporate leaders and high-level public officials involved

in negotiations. Results from this research will be circulated to

participating partners in Brazil to inform subsequent phases of

the packaging sector agreement. Recommendations will also

be presented at a market system co-design workshop in Ghana

in August 2018, where government officials, wastepickers, and

multinational corporations will co-design an inclusive recycling

system for the city of Accra.

Future impactecause the basis for EPR policies is those established in

the European Union and other OECD nations, simply

replicating existing policies may not be appropriate

for distinct contexts. Evaluating inclusive recycling practices

under Brazil’s National Solid Waste Policy hopes to improve

implementation of the PNRS by informing a future iteration of

Brazil’s EPR system that more directly benefits wastepickers. This

research also provides a case study of the adaptation of EPR to

the global South, where wastepickers and other small-scale actors

play an important role.

Evaluating Inclusive Recycling Practices Under Brazil’s National Solid Waste Policy

Development through Dialogue, Design & Dissemination

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FIELD RESEARCH

Talia (left) spent a total of nearly three months in Brazil learning about the wastepickers’ movement and its role in the development of Brazil’s waste policies. In the time between her two field visits, Talia analyzed her data in the context of the country’s ongoing political and historical dynamics. She connected with staff of local nonprofits and corporations, whose support will enable her to return recommendations to the networks of wastepickers, researchers, and technicians who shared their time and information.

AcknowledgmentsThis research was made possible by MIT International Science

and Technology Initiatives (MISTI) Brazil, the Priscilla King Gray

(PKG) Public Service Center, Danone Brazil, and MIT D-Lab.

Talia would like to thank her advisor Gabriella Carolini, reader

and D-Lab Inclusive Markets Specialist Libby McDonald, D-Lab:

Waste instructors Kate Mytty and Jennifer Hiser, staff of the Nenuca

Institute for Sustainable Development (INSEA) and Women in

Informal Employment: Globalizing and Organizing (WIEGO), and

all of the interviewees, in particular wastepickers and leaders of the

MNCR. This D-Brief was written by Talia Fox. All photos courtesy

of Talia Fox.

MIT D-Lab Inclusive MarketsThe MIT D-Lab Inclusive Markets program engages with regional

and community leaders to develop inclusive businesses, markets,

and economies that promote equity, resourcefulness, and resilience

for people living in poverty.

Further information & full thesisLibby McDonald, MIT D-Lab Inclusive Markets Specialist: libmac@mit.edu; Talia Fox, MCP: tfox@mit.edu

MIT D-Lab, Massachusetts Institute of Technology 77 Massachusetts Ave., N51-301, Cambridge, MA 02139 USA

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Image on page one header: . Recyclable materials sorted by members of the Açao Reciclar Cooperative in Poços de Caldas, July 2018

1 While in Brazil, many wastepickers are incorporated into formal systems, most wastepickers around the globe are part of informal economies.